After years of waiting, I finally got my very own Nigerian (or actually in this case Senegalese) 419 scam e-mail in my inbox today. It was from a lovely "God-fearing" person (possibly female, but hard to tell) named "Pracious Desmond". It was the common love trap/money in an inaccessible bank type of scam letter. I won't bother reprinting it because with its spelling and grammar errors galore it is enough to give you a major headache. Anyway, I decided to respond with a story of woe of my own. I know this has been done to death, but this is my first chance to do it myself so I'm excited. I used a fake e-mail address I created to keep my real name out of it:

To: praciousdesmond@yahoo.com
From: Tim
My dear Pracious Desmond, it is so fortuitous that you write to your love (me) now!  You see, I have been waiting to hear from a God-fearing woman who will understand the terrible situation I find myself in at this time.  My father was a politician in Canada before the great Québécois Uprising 5 years ago which started the awful Canadian Civil War in which my father and the rest of my family were executed by guillotine and/or boiled alive in great vats of poutine.  Before he died my father managed to sell off the Canadian Crown Jewels and hid the money in the International Commerce Bank in Senegal S.A.  The total value of the crown jewels was over 100,000,000,000 Canadian dollars.  Unfortunately I am trapped in a Canadian refugee camp in Alaska and have no way of accessing the money.  I have spoken to our spiritual leader Pastor Todd Palin and his wife Sarah allowed me to use one of the few computers here in Alaska that is connected to the internet in hopes of finding my true Christian love.  And you found me right away!  Oh my dear, I need your help.  I need to bribe the camp guards to get myself to the airport in Anchorage.  From there I can charter a plane to Senegal.  Oh, if only my love for you could give me wings none of this would be necessary, but unfortunately I cannot pay the bribes to escape.  I have heard that the Canadian troops are massing on the border with Alaska and could be here any day now, so time is of the essence.  We have a small general store here that can receive Western Union payments.  My love, will you help me?  I need $500 American dollars to bribe the guards and secure transport to Anchorage.  From there I will be able to contact you and further our love plans.  Please my dear Pracious Desmond, can you help me?

In sincerest Christian powerful God-fearing love feelings,
Tim

Can't wait to hear if she'll be able to help me out!

Looks like after 14 years I'm going to have to get used to life without a car.  I need to feel free and this makes my room feel even more like a prison.  A nice one, but a prison nonetheless.  And it's not like I want a Beamer or anything really nice.  Just something that moves and doesn't catch on fire like the last one did.

Best part of all of this is that because it wasn't an accident that caused it I'll still be making payments on a ghost vehicle.

Things really have spiraled further down than I'd ever imagined.  Not just in my life but those I care about as well.  This is just another thing on the "terrible or at least extremely inconvenient and annoying list" that has been defining my life lately.

Life is such a wonderful gift.  I wake up every morning and scream that fact to any deity that may or may not be up there messing around with me.  I really hope they're getting their kicks, the little frat-boy bastards.

I'm so tired.

You'd think as I'm nearing my 30th birthday that I would know better than to open myself up to a self-obsessed two-faced diva, but alas I still seem to have a few lessons to learn.

I know I''m a good person. I've been told that I do things out of love. Self-obsessed and pathetic aren't words normally used to describe me but they were tonight with quite a bit of vitrol. I'll admit that they stung pretty badly and I was quite upset. But luckily I have some wonderful people in my life that have reminded me that I do have some very positive qualities and deserve so much better.

I wish no ill to the person that decided to visciously attack me in such a way. I truly do care about her and really hope she gets the help she needs. She has so much potential, but squanders it on what someone called the "MTV mindset".

My heart has been closed off for so long (by choice) but I thought maybe it was worth opening up this time. Guess I was wrong. I'm starting to feel a litttle better, but I did invest quite a bit emotionally into this black hole of a person so the recovery won't be instant. My self-esteem is recovering though, and tomorrow will be a better day I'm sure. I have the whole weekend with Ariel and being with her never fails to cheer me up.

This was from Depeche Mode's Singles 86>98 Tour way back in 1998.  November 1st, 1998 to be precise, at the Spectrum in Philadelphia.  It was the first time I'd seen the band live.

I'm not a religious man, but going to this show I think I felt the same way those people going to evangelical revivals feel...  for a couple of hours at least.  Some people may think it's pathetic or immature that a pop band would do that to you, but at least they're not just my imaginary friend.  I gave those up when I was about 5.

The amazing thing is that when I saw them again 8 years later in New Jersey, I felt exactly the same way.  And it was a very rough time for me during that period of my life, yet all that was peeled away for a few hours and I really felt alive.

When I saw Dave Gahan solo about a year before that, it was also a "religious" experience (when he played the DM songs at least).  Someone very close to me that went with me even commented that it was the only time she'd seen me truly happy.

To this day, as many times as I've heard it, I never get sick of hearing Enjoy the Silence.  Maybe it's an obsession, but I think it's a healthy one.

I've certainly had my differences with this state, but today (for maybe the first time ever) I can honestly say I'm proud to be a Virginian.

I grew up in the so-called "real" Virginia, and I've never lived in Washington DC. My family has been in Virginia since the mid-seventeenth century. But apparently even though my driver's license is still one issued by Virginia with a Virginia address printed on it I'm apparently no longer a resident because I moved up north.  In fact I may no longer exist at all according to the lady in the video. What a bunch of... there isn't really a word strong enough to describe this.

Please don't let me down Virginia.  Stay blue like the CNN map says on November 4th and help keep McBush out of the White House.

We created the Machine, to do our will, but we cannot make it do our will now. It has robbed us of the sense of space and of the sense of touch, it has blurred every human relation and narrowed down love to a carnal act, it has paralysed our bodies and our wills, and now it compels us to worship it.

From The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster, written in 1909 if you can believe it.  The full story is here.  Definitely worth the read if you have the time.

Maybe I'm just getting old.  But I really believe that anyone who uses words like "thinky" or "squee", liberally uses OMG, and describes characters in a production by listing their emotion followed by an exclamation point and the character name (ex. annoyed!Barry) is a complete moron with the emotional development of a 5-year old.

If they wanted to haul an old sci-fi show out of mothballs and turn it into some crappy meta-fiction swamped post-post-post-postmodern/ironic half-assed clone of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, why did it have to be Doctor Who?  I'm sure Buck Rogers or Mork & Mindy would've done just as well.  Hell, with the lack of meaningful characterization, "magic wand" plotting, and generally poor level of writing this show has sunk to they could've just remade BJ and the Bear but set on a spaceship instead of a big rig and people would lap it up.

At least this year I was somewhat prepared for the finale to be crap, so I can honestly say I wasn't disappointed.

If anyone remembers The Brave Little Toaster, this reminds me of the flower the Toaster found in the forest all by itself.  It fell in love with its reflection in the Toaster's shiny metal casing before withering away from loneliness when the Toaster pulled away from its embrace.  Still brings a tear to my eye, what can I say?

The image doesn't really do her beauty justice, but the only easily accessible camera at the moment is the one in my phone.  When I got her she only had two blooming flowers.  Amazingly I've managed to keep her alive and flourishing, so I thought maybe it was time for a name.  Any ideas?

I keep seeing these somewhat cheap looking hoodies and vests with the company name The North Face printed on the front.  I couldn't figure out why they were so popular until today when I was riding home on the train.  I happened to catch a glimpse of the cuff on the jacket of the man next to me.  There was yet another logo.  But this time it said APEX.  Then it dawned on me that the logo was the same as the cheap DVD player I have that hardly ever works.  So the clothes must come free with each $50 player.  I guess I'd wear them too under those circumstances, but mine didn't come with one for some strange reason.  Oh well.

EDIT: Not North Star, it was The North Face.

You know, I'm sick of being negative about Doctor Who.  But it really has become embarrassingly bad.  I watched the series premiere tonight and it actually made the Torchwood series finale I watched last night look half-decent.  At least that particular episode of Torchwood only had a single unrealistic one-dimensional character instead of an entire cast made up of them, including the Doctor himself.  And plot?  Bah, who needs a plot when you can fill your characters with lame one-liners and beat people over the head with silly, overly bombastic, and entirely inappropriate orchestral music every time a character so much as blinks.  Utter crap.  Why do I keep doing this to myself?

On a more positive note, the season opener of Battlestar Galactica was quite good.  And Ashes to Ashes holds up the premise developed in Life on Mars surprisingly well.

AOL sez...
Silly human, WE decide when to stop charging your credit card, not you!

Verizon has the exact SAME POLICY as AOL does for "retaining" customers. At least in the DSL department in which I worked for a while. In fact I'd go so far to say that all communication companies (ISPs, wireless phones, etc.) have a Retention department equipped with all sorts of nasty psychological tricks and manipulation techniques.

Original article can be found here.

My old keyboard decided to suddenly and mysteriously die on me so I was forced to buy a new one.  Now the above device shows up in my hardware list.  I wonder if this is something I should be concerned about...

I think I'm going to take a pass on watching Doctor Who next season unless something amazing happens next week.  I've been a fan for 22 years and this is the first time I've felt like that.  It's been such a big part of my life and a huge influence on me that this makes me very sad.  But the show has turned into a pantomime of itself and is becoming painful to watch.  I find myself actually hoping it gets cancelled so a few years can go by and someone else can possibly revive it again.  The episode this past Saturday was such utter trash that I don't even really want to talk about what went on in it.  There are some great elements to it and there's some amazing talent involved, but Russell T Davies (the head writer and producer) has flushed all that down the toilet in favor of a few cheap and extremely unfunny jokes.  The show has had some major crap in it before (I'm thinking the mid-80's here) but at least it always seemed to take itself seriously.  And the special effects may have been bad, but the writing was never this condescending.  Doctor Who used to be an innovative and intelligent program.  Now it's just a bad SNL skit.

The members of the Rational Response Squad squared off with Christians Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort about the existence of God on Nightline.  Click on the image above to view the complete story.

Main Entry: moron
Pronunciation: 'mor-"än
Function: noun
Etymology: irregular from Greek mOros foolish, stupid
1 usually offensive : a mildly mentally retarded person
2 : a very stupid person

Above are four people that I find fit this description pretty well.  Also I'd include Martin Bashir, their "moderator" and the brain trust that thought up this whole exercise in futility.  Why do people feel the need to argue about the existence/non-existence of God?  It never achieves anything, other than lots of angry yelling at each other.  This isn't like debating the merits of increasing the tax on cigarettes, or what color you should paint your house.  This is a very personal belief, probably the most personal belief that ever was.  This question cannot be definitively answered one way or another by proof, or even faith really when it comes to convincing others.  If you don't believe in God then you most likely believe in Evolution, so what makes you think we've got all the faculties necessary now to unlock ALL the secrets of the Universe, including whether or not there is a higher power or not?  What if we don't have that capacity yet?  And if you do believe in God, then what makes you think that as human beings that we have the same omniscience as God to definitively know how the Universe came into existence?  Wouldn't that be saying we're just as powerful and all-knowing?

This constant arguing is both pointless and tedious.  It's hard to fathom that the four people in the picture above truly believe that they're doing their respective sides any good at all by bickering like a bunch of kindergarteners.  Leave it alone and let people figure things out for themselves.  Religion and science don't have to conflict if people would just admit that they don't have all the answers and let go of this constant need to be "right" all the time.

I'm off to New York for the weekend.  I'm flying out of Richmond tomorrow night and will be back Sunday.  Going to see my very favorite Hamilton in the world, my best friend from childhood, and one of my very bestest friends in the world.  It's gonna rock to no small extent :)

So there are people protesting Queen Elizabeth II's visit to Richmond on Thursday...  I am alone in seeing the humor in this?  I mean really, what a colossal waste of time!  Apparently this is to protest the "colonialism, imperialism, and racism that the monarchy represents".  Ok fine, but why waste your breath on the monarchy in the UK?  Maybe 100 years ago this would have been a worthwhile endeavor, but the English monarchy in the present day yields no power whatsoever.  On paper maybe, but in practice they can't do a damn thing.  Hell, the Queen even opposed the Iraq War from the beginning and it didn't do any good.  Shouldn't people be putting their energy into protesting to people that have some sort of power to change things?  I see something like this and it's no wonder people don't take protesters as seriously as they did 30 years ago.

Of course it doesn't stop there.  The organizers of the protest go on to say that "this is in addition to the undeniable fact that Jamestown’s founding was predicated on the genocide of Native Americans and the enslavement of African Americans."  As much as I hate to say it because I really am saddened by slavery and the massacre of the Native Americans during the formative years of the country, the above statement just isn't historically accurate.  Not even close really, and it just makes the person look really stupid.  Jamestown was formed to make money, period.  They didn't come here to attack the natives.  At first anyway, relations were somewhat peaceful at least in the fact that attempts were made by both sides to form a truce or alliance.  As far as slavery, that horrible chapter in our history didn't begin until 1654 in Northampton County.  The first Africans to come to Jamestown in 1619 were indentured servants who were eventually freed.  It didn't stay like that for long unfortunately, but to blame slavery on the forming of Jamestown just doesn't make any sense.  Things were handled really terribly in the later part of the 17th century, but it didn't have to be that way.  Colonizing Jamestown wasn't the cause.  You might as well blame the Phoenicians or the Vikings for coming up with the idea to travel here.

The sad thing about all this is that I agree with the organizers' principles, but their execution leaves a lot to be desired.  I really thing it's doing more harm than good to the causes they are supposedly fighting for.